Down Ditch

My grandmother woke me to help with the head gate. Tuesday. Irrigation day from Encino Street north in Tularosa, New Mexico. Sr. Lucero and RJ were already out staring at the ditch across the street. I figured this didn't bode well. My grandmother's neighbor, Estelle, met us at the gate between their houses. She fixed me with a stare, reading my city clothes and clearly doubting my abilities in this crucial arena.
--Ready to be a farmer?
--I guess.

In Estelle's yard leaning against an odd pile of artifacts—coffee can, broken wire brush, small wood thingy with a wire handle—was a sheet of metal welded to a stainless steel bar. This, apparently, was the head gate. The two grandmothers needed me to help carry it. My grandmother took the mysterious wood thingy. We tromped across the street, all three in rubber boots, to a grate flush with the ground and echoing with running water. Open grate, observe stream.
--My lands! It's running slow.
--Must be the Texan across the street. He doesn't know how to irrigate properly.
In goes the wood thingy, followed by the sheet metal contraption. None of it fits very well.
--You can never get it all closed.

More commentary about the inordinately slow water as it begins running perpidicular to the mother ditch and pouring into Estelle's ditches and yard. The yard isn't filling as fast as what is judged to be normal. My grandmother is down ditch from Estelle and the slow water hits her ditches. All the strange, apparently jury-rigged, contraptions in grandmother's yard—cinder blocks, bits of old signs—suddenly take on new meaning as they direct the water rather precisely to the trees and roses and greenish spots.

By 9 am the neighbors are gathered about the fence. Would someone be able to help Sr. Duran?
--Last time he forgot to watch and it ran over into my garage.
More commentary about the slow water. More grumbling about the Texan. Sr. Lucero had talked to him first thing that morning.
--He don't listen.

Grousing commences about the ditch boss, who is generally agreed to be less than useful. Four people have already complained to him about the slow water. Discussion moves on to the bad head gate.
--He won't fix it, say's it is the user's responsibility.
--It is not! It's on the acequia madre, that's his responsibility.

It is universally agreed that he isn't helpful. It is also universally agreed that no one else wants the job.
--Four complaints already this morning! My lands!
--Poor man.

More discussion about various neighbors and their irrigation skills or lack thereof. Concern about other elderly or sick folks; Sr. Lucero peels off to check on the grandmothers down ditch. Visiting continues apace as the yards slowly fill with the water that will grow trees, flowers, vegetables, Tularosa itself. Someone remembers pushing a nun into the ditch next to the church.
--She deserved it She was really mean to all the kids.
--My lands!

For one day an entire set of blocks in Tularosa is intimately linked by the ditch. There is no escaping it, those downstream need those upstream. A yard free of water is noticed. Is someone sick? Dead? Out of town? Water running over a yard and into the street is also noticed. Is someone stupid? Some kind of foreigner like the Texan? Sick? Hurt? Dead?

All morning as I splashed around, I cast about desperately to see if I could turn this into a metaphor of faith and community, of God among us. Was it better than Paul's metaphor of the body, each member as a key component of the body of Christ? Or, at least more timely and relevant in this place? No, not quite. The best I could come up with was the ditch as the Holy Spirit, flowing among us, calling us together, making us recognize God in each of us, whether we like it or not. Or maybe it is like love, true community love, a sense of tie and connection, tolerance and support for everyone.

We are losing these ditches, both literal and metaphorical. If we don't learn to compensate, to understand that ditch or no ditch we all are tied together by the flow of our common spirit and life, we will perish. The ditch connects us all, whether we know it or not. We need to find those ditches in all our communities.

....names have been changed.....